(Warren Beath is the author of The Death of
James Dean, a seminal work on Dean's last
days, Grove Press, 1986. He is also the
author of a controversial novel, Who Killed James Dean?, TOR Books, 1995. This article
was written especially for American Legends.)

As with most deities, James Dean's death is
observed with the same enthusiastic ferocity as
his life. On September 30, 1955, the twenty-four
year old actor gassed up his Porsche Spyder on
Beverly Glen, then sped off into eternity.
The highway Dean drove down has also
become part of American iconography.
Each year, on the anniversary of
Dean's fatal crash, the faithful gather to retrace
his last drive and remember the young man who died...
only to be reborn as a legend.

If you retrace Dean's route, start your day
with a doughnut at Farmer's Market, not far from
the (former) Vine Street site of Competition
Motors where Dean had his Porsche tuned that
fateful day. Today, a Goodyear dealership
has replaced the motor shop. Jimmy had a
doughnut at the old Ranch Market which also
no longer exists.

Driving north from Los Angeles (on I-5),
approaching Magic Mountain, you can see stretches
of old Highway 99 on the lefthand side of the
road. Descending the steep Grapevine Grade, you
enter the flatlands below--stretches of land
dotted by oil wells. This is Kern County where
Dean received a ticket for speeding from the
Highway Patrol. At one time, an aluminum likeness
of the actor and his racing car were affixed
to a telephone pole to mark the spot. Now,
only the outline of Dean's name remains.

Passing through Bakersfield, you will notice
some old airplane hangers at the Lerdo Turnoff.
The hangers were part of Minter Field--a former
airfield where James Dean
had raced his Porsche Speedster in
May 1955. Dean placed third; the trophy he
won is now in the Fairmount Museum. The
airport has its own museum; there is a
little section devoted to Dean with a facsimile of the racing program from that
long ago day.

Five miles to the north, hang a left onto Route
46, which was 466 in the 1950s. This two lane road
has changed very little since Dean drove on it. The
dot in the road up ahead is Blackwells Corner--a
former general store which billed itself for years
as "James Dean's Last Stop." It was here that Dean
bought an apple and a Coke; the original building
burned down under mysterious circumstances in 1967.
The avid souvenir hunter can pry a chunk of concrete
from the original foundation. I use mine as a doorstop.

Then move on: westward, toward the Polonio Pass,
a landmark that was the subject of a cult article
in Whisper magazine: "The Ghost of James
Dean Haunts Polonio Pass..."

At the top of the hill, you can look down
into the valley and see the fatal intersection.
The new highway winds around the old
route, but to your left you can see the
remnant of the original road surface that Dean
drove on. A quarter mile from the site, you
pass the small trees where the actor literally
ran some people off the road as he raced by.
The original intersection has been obliterated by
rechanneling, but you can make out the topographical
features that were immortalized in the
photographs that Sanford Roth took after the
crash. Roth had been assigned by Collier's to
do a story on the new star and was accompanying
Dean to the races in Salinas that day.

Over the years, I have met some fascinating
people at the site (and some dizzy ones, too).
The accents include German, French, Norwegian,
and British.

Some of the items people bring are unusual:
kitsch. But there are interesting surprises.
One fellow had a piece of the aluminum Porsche
Spyder which he had plucked from the wreckage.
It is an interesting day, an event--and meditative
exercise which makes a visitor to the shrine
feel that he or she has approached the essence
of the James Dean mystique.